Ok we're back mobile again thanks to borgenson and ebay got a screaming deal on the lower u joint/damper, found a seller who had pile of them that were apparently display units that had never been on a vehicle. $32 shipped, he was wanting $40 with a best offer option.
Sliding 3/4 to 1" DD shaft and upper u joint I had to pay prevailing price for, $75 for upper coupler and $60 for the 18" sliding shaft

Shaft came with 2soft rivets thru it holding the shaft extended but overlapped about 5-6". 18" overall. I had to break the rivets, slide the 2 halves into each other further and cut 1-1/2" off of each end in the chop saw to get it short enough to work.
I drill/dimpled the shaft ends where the setscrews would land, and red loctite the 2 ends of the shaft that went to couplers and blue loctited the ends that go on the gearbox and on the column stub shaft.
All ujoint ends had 2 setscrews each except for the end that is splined for the gearbox, it only has 1. Maiden voyage with new steering shaft was pulling my utility trailer with 2 garden tractors on it, much better than it was
Once the original started binding up, it was steady for a while with the amount of increased effort to steer /and then all of a sudden within a few days it got really stiff.